Editorial August 23, 1913 Issue

"BE THOU CLEAN"

Archibald McLellan

It sometimes happens that persons who have tried in vain to be healed through medical treatment, perhaps at much expense and with much suffering because of the means employed, and who have as a last resort turned to Christian Science, cherish a strong sense of resentment not only toward the system which had failed to relieve them from their ills, but also toward those through whom it had been employed. This should not be, and every wise practitioner to whom such a patient comes will do all he can to correct this condition of thought, knowing full well that only as hatred gives place to love, and resentment to compassion, will the healing be accomplished. Mrs. Eddy, on page 444 of Science and Health, very clearly states what the attitude of Christian Scientists should be toward those who fail to accept her teachings. She writes, "If ecclesiastical sects or medical schools turn a deaf ear to the teachings of Christian Science, then part from these opponents as did Abraham when he parted from Lot, and say in thy heart: 'Let there be no strife, I pray thee, between me and thee, and between my herdmen and thy herdmen; for we be brethren,'" and the spirit of this saying should govern her every follower.

This does not mean, however, that Christian Scientists are to try to mingle Spirit and matter, a spiritual method of healing and one which is wholly material. To attempt this would be as unwise and useless as to attempt to mingle any other opposites and expect harmonious results. "There is but one way to heaven, harmony," Mrs. Eddy tells us, "and Christ in divine Science shows us this way. It is to know no other reality—to have no other consciousness of life—than good, God and His reflection, and to rise superior to the so-called pain and pleasure of the senses" (Science and Health, p. 242). Patiently, lovingly, and faithfully the practitioner must labor to uncover the erroneous thinking of his patient, then show him that to cherish thoughts of enmity against another is not only wrong in itself, but that he is really doing an injustice to a profession which, however diverse in its views, nevertheless has for its object the amelioration of suffering, and the majority of its members give themselves to the duties of their chosen calling with a commendable spirit of devotion and self-sacrifice.

The practitioner must, however, be clear in his own realization that there can be no compromise between truth and error, must see that he who turns to God for healing and salvation has no part or lot in the system from whose cerements he is struggling to free himself. The Master's command to those who witnessed his freeing of Lazarus from the swathings of sense which bound him was, "Loose him, and let him go," and the faithful Christian Science practitioner will strive to free his patient not only from every thought of bitterness or hatred, but from every least dependence upon aught but the power of Truth to save him from the ills of the flesh; teach him how literally to obey the Master's command to take no thought for this mortal body that has been dosed and drugged and dieted and manipulated all these weary years.

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